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Son of Astor Is Said to Face Criminal Case

Anthony Marshall left the Westchester County Courthouse with his wife Charlene in August.Credit
Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times

Brooke Astor’s only son and one of her former lawyers have been indicted on criminal charges stemming from the stewardship of her financial affairs and the handling of her will, according to people who were briefed on the situation.

Her son, Anthony D. Marshall, 83, and the lawyer, Francis X. Morrissey Jr., have been told to surrender to authorities today, those who were briefed said.

A Manhattan grand jury has been hearing evidence from witnesses since mid-September, following an investigation by the district attorney’s office into, among other issues, the management of Mrs. Astor’s fortune by Mr. Marshall as well as Mr. Morrissey’s role in the signing of a third amendment to her 2002 will.

The exact charges against the two men, who have been partners in a theater production company, were not known.

Prosecutors were believed to be investigating millions of dollars in cash, property and stocks that Mr. Marshall obtained over the years in his role as steward of his mother’s finances.

That included the sale of one of Mrs. Astor’s favorite paintings, “Flags, Fifth Avenue,” also known as “Up the Avenue from Thirty-Fourth Street, May 1917,” by Childe Hassam, for $10 million.

Mr. Marshall collected a $2 million fee from his mother for handling the transaction.

The prosecutors have been looking into whether these various transactions were in the best interest of Mrs. Astor or whether they were larcenous.

The district attorney’s office was also informed by Mrs. Astor’s court-appointed lawyer, who had retained a nationally known handwriting expert, that the signature on the third amendment, which was made in March 2004, was possibly forged. According to records and interviews, Mr. Morrissey was one of those present at the signing.

Investigators have also looked at an amendment made earlier that year that gave Mrs. Astor’s residuary estate outright to Mr. Marshall and designated him as executor of the estate. By comparison, Mr. Marshall was to get 7 percent a year of the fair market value of the entire residuary under the original terms of his mother’s 2002 will.

Mr. Morrissey’s lawyer, Michael S. Ross, said yesterday that his client was out of the country and would surrender later in the week. “Mr. Morrissey vigorously denies having acted improperly and looks forward to his day in court,” Mr. Ross said. He added that Mr. Morrissey “will plead not guilty at his arraignment.”

Mr. Marshall did not return a call last night to his home in New York City.

Mrs. Astor, the philanthropist and society doyenne, died in August at age 105. Her estate is valued at about $132 million, in addition to a trust estimated to be worth more than $60 million.

The indictments mark the first time that criminal charges have been filed in a fractious legal battle concerning Mrs. Astor’s well-being and fortune that began in July 2006.

That is when Mr. Marshall’s son, Philip Marshall, 54, filed a petition in State Supreme Court accusing his father of neglecting Mrs. Astor’s care while trying to enrich himself with her wealth. Last December, based on a court evaluator’s report that has not been made public, a judge said that the claims of elder abuse were unsubstantiated.

Philip Marshall said yesterday that he had no comment on the criminal charges against his father or Mr. Morrissey.

The Manhattan district attorney’s inquiry has lasted about a year, directed by Elizabeth Loewy, a prosecutor who leads the Elder Abuse Unit, which is part of the Special Prosecutions Bureau of the district attorney’s office.

Prosecutors have been trying to determine, among other issues, whether Mrs. Astor was the target of undue influence related to millions of dollars in money and property transfers in the last several years that benefited Mr. Marshall, who had his mother’s power of attorney.

JPMorgan Chase, the court-appointed guardian of Mrs. Astor’s assets, raised questions in a report last year about her mental competency in 2003. That year, Mrs. Astor signed documents transferring $3.4 million of her securities and her seaside Maine estate, valued at $5.5 million, to her son.

Mr. Marshall, in recent years, has also directed hundreds of thousands of dollars of her money to his theater production company and used $100,000 of her fortune to finance a charitable organization established by his wife, Charlene. Mr. Marshall has said that all of those transactions were made with the full approval of his mother.

The signature on the amended will has been one area of interest to prosecutors. According to interviews and records, several people attended the signing of the amended will in 2004. They were two of her aides and Mr. Morrissey, a lawyer with whom Mr. Marshall had a close working relationship at the time. The amendment stipulated that Mrs. Astor’s real estate was to be sold upon her death and the proceeds added to her residuary estate.

For two years in the mid-1990s, Mr. Morrissey was suspended from practicing law in New York State for mishandling a client’s escrow account.

After the family battle erupted, Mrs. Astor’s former court-appointed lawyer, Susan I. Robbins, saw that the signature on the 2004 amendment was thicker and firmer than the ones on the two earlier amendments.

Ms. Robbins retained a handwriting expert who concluded that Mrs. Astor “could not have written the questioned ‘Brooke Russell Astor’ signature dated March 3, 2004, due to the deterioration of her ability to write her name.” Ms. Robbins brought the findings to the district attorney.

Yesterday, the district attorney’s office, which is expected to hold a news conference on the indictments today, declined to comment. One of Mr. Marshall’s lawyers, Kenneth E. Warner, also declined to comment.

Any indictments will most likely further complicate settlement talks in Surrogate’s Court in Westchester designed to resolve the dispute over Mrs. Astor’s estate. The talks came to a halt in September at the request of the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which was presenting evidence to the grand jury.

A version of this article appears in print on , on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Son of Astor Is Said to Face Criminal Case. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe